A modest field adjacent to a residential development in Stoke-on-Trent has become the focal point of a new alien-themed theatrical production, inspired by actual events.
The upcoming stage play, Bright Lights Over Bentilee, narrates the incident where numerous individuals on an estate in the town asserted they had observed bright lights in the sky along with a UFO descending onto the field next to their residences.
Sky News interviewed playwright and former Coronation Street actress Deborah McAndrew to explore the occurrences of September 2, 1967, and her motivation for bringing this narrative to the stage.
“Witnesses described a massive red saucer-shaped craft, approximately the dimensions of a car,” she detailed.
That evening, shortly after 9 PM, witnesses reported eight distinct sightings of a mysterious “luminescent craft,” which quietly hovered above the heads of the residents.
Housewives, children, and even a police officer claimed to have spotted it, stating it changed colors before descending into the brush.
The witnesses recounted how, while searching the fields for the craft, it then “soared upwards, emitting a brilliant white light akin to a car’s headlights… and then simply vanished.”
McAndrew became engrossed in uncovering the truth behind the incident after discovering archival news footage featuring interviews with residents from that timeframe.
Intrigued by how the locals seemed to return to their routine the following day without any disruption, she began her investigation, which included conversations with one of the young witnesses who had pursued the craft.
“When nothing significant takes place, it slowly transforms into folklore… until a random playwright contacts you decades later asking, ‘Would you like to recount your UFO sighting?'” McAndrew elaborated.
While she acknowledges “there’s no definitive way to ascertain what it was,” the playwright asserts, “when individuals recount their experiences to me, I take them seriously.”
Although skeptics may suggest that given the context of the space race, locals might have confused a UFO with a satellite, McAndrew counters: “It was a landing; it didn’t merely glide overhead; it descended before ascending once more.”
Could television programs have played a role? As the popularity of sci-fi culture grew, the Ministry of Defence observed a gradual rise in UFO sighting reports.
Actress Polly Lister, portraying a housewife named Beverley in the production, states: “It would be quite challenging to entirely dismiss it, as I truly believe that each of these individuals is sharing the genuine account of what they witnessed.”
Eddy Westbury, another actor in the show, remarks: “You often hear numerous accounts from people in America… but this case is notably intriguing due to the various testimonies… entirely distinct individuals, in separate locations… it wasn’t as if [they] spotted a green man jumping from a vehicle; rather, what they observed and experienced appears to align.”
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Did the residents witness something ‘extraordinary?’
While the reality might be elusive, they will have to be satisfied with the dramatized portrayal that delves into the community’s aftermath following that eventful night.
Claybody Theatre’s Bright Lights Over Bentilee will run until 12 October at The Dipping House in Stoke.